You call that a solar fire-starter?In high school, we had an old ~2.5 foot diameter mirror from a spotlight -- it would start just about anything on fire... I recall getting a gym towel blazing in the middle of winter.

Why waste time and energy finding kindling with regular fire starters that may or may not even catch a spark?! Regular twigs and branches in their natural environments will not light unless they are e ...

Magnifying glass was my tool of choice for fire starting. I remember going on an orientation outing with a bunch of school kids, and I was the first to get a fire going. I brought 2 pieces of paper for tinder, and the adults were telling me it's not going to work. When I got it going they surmised that the fact the paper was orange meant it had something in it to make it burn better than normal paper.

So - it doesn't work on non-sunny days/night, but its way cheaper than $40, and you can use it for other stuff (looking at bugs, fungi, etc)